Agence France Presse
August 7, 2002
Weeping East Timor witness blames Indonesian army for 1999 unrest
JAKARTA,
A leading former East Timorese independence supporter wept Wednesday
as he
recalled the death of his son in a 1999 militia attack on his refugee-packed
home in Dili.
Judges at Indonesia's human rights court briefly halted proceedings
as
Manuel Carrascalao sobbed uncontrollably.
He told the court that the Indonesian army, especially the Kopassus
special
forces, were to blame for the violence across East Timor that year.
Soldiers killed people "just as if they were cutting grass," he added.
Carrascalao, a brother of former East Timor governor Mario Viegas
Carrascalao, said: "The military became very cruel to the people,
especially
in
the 1980s, after Prabowo came to East Timor."
He was referring to Prabowo Subianto, a son-in-law of former president
Suharto and a leader of Kopassus at the time.
When asked by the judges who was to blame for the violence before and
after
the August vote to break from Indonesia, Carrascalao replied: "The
Kopassus."
He described it as the fiercest military unit in Timor which had acted
cruelly against local people.
"I was initially a supporter of the Indonesian armed forces ...
but after
seeing their increasing cruelty, I gradually distanced myself from them,"
Carrascalao said.
He said resentment of the military was one of the major reasons behind
opposition to Indonesian rule in East Timor.
Carrascalao also said soldiers, although not in uniform, were among
the
attackers of his refugee-filled home in Dili on April 17, 1999.
"Some of the militias were not East Timorese, and who else but
soldiers
would
those non-East Timorese be?" Carrascalao said.
He also said he believed the militias received training from the Indonesian
military because otherwise "how can they get such skills?"
Hundreds of militia members, some armed with firearms, attacked
Carrascalao's
home after attending a pro- Indonesia rally in front of the governor's
office.
Some 136 refugees were holed up in the house at that time, many of whom
had
been there for more than three weeks.
Officials and court documents said 12 people, including Carrascalao's
youngest son Manuelito, were killed. Carrascalao himself speculated that
up to
60 people might have perished.
Carrascalao was testifying in the case of Lieutenant Colonel Hulman
Gultom,
the Dili district police commander at the time.
Gultom is one of 18 officers, officials and civilians facing trials
over
gross human rights violations in East Timor in 1999.
At a separate trial lawyers for the former military chief in East Timor,
Colonel Nur Muis, said the human rights court had no authority to try
him on
charges of ignoring the massacre of at least 39 civilians.
The court has no authority to hear cases of rights abuses in East Timor
because it was set up after the violence, the lawyers said. This breached
constitutional and other safeguards against retroactive legislation, they
argued.
The militias, created and supported by Indonesian military elements,
waged
a
campaign of intimidation before the vote and of revenge afterwards. At
least
1,000 East Timorese are estimated to have died in 1999 and whole towns
were
burnt to the ground.
Indonesia set up the court to deflect pressure for a UN tribunal into
the
violence and the first verdicts are expected next week. It is being closely
watched by the world for proof that Jakarta will punish those behind the
violence.